Books by Ángel Alcalde
Sussex Academic Press, 2021
The July 1936 coup d’état against the Spanish Second Republic brought together a diversity of ant... more The July 1936 coup d’état against the Spanish Second Republic brought together a diversity of anti-Republican political and social groups under the leadership of rebel Africanista military officers. In the ensuing Civil War this coalition gradually came under the rule of Generalissimo Franco. This volume explores the hypothesis that the violence and combat experiences of the war were the fundamental ideological crucible for the Francoist regime. The rebels were a group of reactionary and anti-liberal forces with little ideological or political coherence, but they emerged from the conflict not only victorious but ideologically united under the dictator’s power. Key to understanding this transition are the different political cultures of the rebel army, how the combatants’ war experiences contributed to the transformation of diverse rebel groups, and the role of foreign armed intervention.
The contributors examine not only the endogenous Spanish political and military cultures of the Francoist coalition, but also the transnational influence of foreign groups. The roots of Francoist political culture are found in the Falangist and Carlist militias, and Civil Guard units, that lent their support to the military rebellion. The war experiences of conscripts, colonial troops, and junior officers forged the Francoist ideology. It was reinforced by fascist influences and assistance from Germany and Italy, and the lesser-known contributions of Swiss volunteers. At the beginning of the conflict the rebel side was not homogeneous. But it weaved together a complex, transnational web of political and military interests in the midst of a bloody and destructive war, transforming itself in the process to a political and dictatorial platform that was to rule Spain for many years.
Cambridge University Press, 2017
This book explores, from a transnational viewpoint, the historical relationship between war veter... more This book explores, from a transnational viewpoint, the historical relationship between war veterans and fascism in interwar Europe. Until now, historians have been roughly divided between those who assume that 'brutalization' (George L. Mosse) led veterans to join fascist movements and those who stress that most ex-soldiers of the Great War became committed pacifists and internationalists. Transcending the debates of the brutalization thesis and drawing upon a wide range of archival and published sources, this work focuses on the interrelated processes of transnationalization and the fascist permeation of veterans' politics in interwar Europe to offer a wider perspective on the history of both fascism and veterans' movements. A combination of mythical constructs, transfers, political communication, encounters and networks within a transnational space explain the relationship between veterans and fascism. Thus, this book offers new insights into the essential ties between fascism and war, and contributes to the theorization of transnational fascism.
This book examines war veterans’ history after 1945 from a global perspective. In the Cold War er... more This book examines war veterans’ history after 1945 from a global perspective. In the Cold War era, in most countries of the world there was a sizeable portion of population with direct war experience. This edited volume gathers contributions which show the veterans’ involvement in all the major historical processes shaping the world after World War II. Cold War politics, racial conflict, decolonization, state-building, and the reshaping of war memory were phenomena in which former soldiers and ex-combatants were directly involved. By examining how different veterans’ groups, movements and organizations challenged or sustained the Cold War, strived to prevent or to foster decolonization, and transcended or supported official memories of war, the volume characterizes veterans as largely independent and autonomous actors which interacted with societies and states in the making of our times. Spanning historical cases from the United States to Hong-Kong, from Europe to Southern Africa, from Algeria to Iran, the volume situates veterans within the turbulent international context since World War II.
The Francoist veterans were a fundamental group of the Franco regime's supporters. This reality j... more The Francoist veterans were a fundamental group of the Franco regime's supporters. This reality justifies researching the Francoist veterans' movement with the same perspective employed to study other European fascist phenomena. This book analyses, on the one hand, the history of the main veterans' organization of the Franco dictatorship - the Delegación Nacional de Excombatientes of FET-JONS -, and, on the other hand, the culture of war that the veterans mantained alive in Spain for decades. It argues that the political organization, the set of discourses and representations, and the management of the veterans' benefits allowed the Francoist regime to conveniently manipulate the veterans: men who were profoundly marked by the Spanish Civil War experience.
Los excombatientes franquistas fueron una parte fundamental del apoyo social al régimen de Franco, realidad que justifica observar el excombatentismo franquista con la misma perspectiva empleada para estudiar los fascismos europeos. Este libro analiza, por un lado, la historia de la principal organización de excombatientes de la dictadura franquista, la Delegación Nacional de Excombatientes de FET-JONS, y, por otro lado, la cultura de guerra que los veteranos de guerra mantuvieron viva en España durante décadas. Se explica cómo el encuadramiento, los discursos y representaciones y los mecanismos de gestión de privilegios sociales permitieron al régimen franquista manipular en su beneficio las identidades excombatientes de aquellos hombres marcados por la experiencia de la guerra civil española.
¿Cómo logró el franquismo hacerse con una base social de masas para alzarse con el poder y sosten... more ¿Cómo logró el franquismo hacerse con una base social de masas para alzarse con el poder y sostenerse en él durante cuatro décadas? La pregunta, no exenta de polémicas, está siendo de candente actualidad en los debates historiográficos de los últimos años. En primer lugar, se ha evidenciado cómo la sublevación de 1936 contra la II República hizo una brutal inversión en violencia represiva que le permitió destruir y someter a sus opositores, contando con un clima internacional propicio. No obstante, el franquismo también dejó abiertas vías de integración, por las que se adhirieron a la dictadura amplios y diversos sectores sociales. Lazos de Sangre aspira a explicar, a partir del caso zaragozano durante la guerra civil, cuáles fueron esas vías integradoras en la capital aragonesa de la retaguardia insurgente. Se demuestra cómo el exiguo núcleo originario del apoyo social a la sublevación procedió de la tupida red de intereses políticos, sociales y económicos de la burguesía propietaria y católica zaragozana, aunada con el fascismo. Y se explica cómo la experiencia bélica y la movilización forzada de la retaguardia, organizada ésta por la Junta Recaudatoria Civil, fueron los fenómenos catalizadores de la integración, con distintos grados de sinceridad e implicación, de una parte de las clases medias y populares zaragozanas en el nuevo Estado. En este proceso, los vínculos interclasistas de sociabilidad, patronazgo, parentesco, asociación, etc. permitieron construir una jerárquica base social de masas para la consolidación de la dictadura, a pesar de sus orígenes sangrientos.
Articles and Book Chapters by Ángel Alcalde
The Journal of Modern History, 2023
This article analyses the decision-making process of Francoist repression during the Spanish Civi... more This article analyses the decision-making process of Francoist repression during the Spanish Civil War. Most historians assume that the different phases and methods of Francoist repression were manifestations of a single “extermination plan” allegedly drafted by anti-Republican conspirators before the war and implemented immediately following the coup d’état of July 17–19, 1936. By carefully observing the escalation of the rebels’ repressive policies and decision-making processes in July and August 1936, this article revises that interpretation. It argues that a repressive exterminatory policy that disregarded all legal considerations was the result of a number of incremental decisions made between July 23 and July 31, 1936, by Generals Queipo de Llano, Franco, and Mola. Drawing inspiration from a long historiographical tradition in holocaust and genocide studies, the article discusses the contextual factors and power dynamics behind these decisions. It shows how the rebels secretly and gradually implemented the exterminatory policy in rebel territory throughout August, and how their policy was reinforced by Franco’s accession to absolute power.
Mujeres, género y violencia en la guerra civil y la dictadura de Franco, 2021
The Historical Journal, 2021
By examining the experience of rape in Spain in the 1930s and 1940s, this article explains how th... more By examining the experience of rape in Spain in the 1930s and 1940s, this article explains how the Spanish Civil War and Franco's dictatorship dramatically increased the likelihood of women becoming victims of sexual assault. Contrary to what historians often assume, this phenomenon was not the result of rape being deliberately used as a 'weapon of war' or as a blunt method of political repression against women. The upsurge in sexual violence was a by-product of structural transformations in the wartime and dictatorial contexts, and it was the direct consequence, rather than the instrument, of the violent imposition of a fascist-inspired regime. Using archival evidence from numerous Spanish archives, the article historicizes rape in a wider cultural, legal, and social context and reveals the essential albeit ambiguous political nature of both wartime and postwar rape. The experience of rape was mostly shaped not by repression but structural factors such as ruralization and social hierarchization, demographic upheavals, exacerbation of violent masculinity models, the proliferation of weapons, and the influence of fascist and national-Catholic ideologies. Rape became an expression of the nature of power and social and gender relations in Franco's regime.
Jesús Casquete y Javier Tajadura (eds.): La Constitución de Weimar. Historia, política y derecho, 2020
Contemporary European History, 2020
War & Society, 2019
This article is a conversation between five specialists of veterans' history on the current direc... more This article is a conversation between five specialists of veterans' history on the current direction of the field and its importance to the study of war and society. The discussants offer an an overview of current methodologies, definitions and historiographical approaches. Concentrating on the experiences of twentieth-century veterans (particularly after 1945) and using a diverse range of case studies from across the world, this article also asks what connections bound veteran communities together, and how we as historians might conceptualise veterans: as a class, as a collective , or as a far looser grouping of individuals? Finally, this article explores what distinguishes veteranhood after 1945 and the evolving relationship between veterans and the memory of conflict.
European Review of History, 2018
This article introduces the dossier 'Spatializing Transnational History: European spaces and terr... more This article introduces the dossier 'Spatializing Transnational History: European spaces and territories'. It examines the intersections between transnational history and the so-called 'spatial turn' in social sciences, and points at future directions in historical research. It reviews two main different methodological approaches to the problem of space in transnational, comparative and global history and examines recent contributions on the history of territory. Finally, it introduces the contributions to this dossier, which approach the history of modern Europe from a number of transnational and spatial perspectives. The dossier argues that incorporating a combination of spatial approaches, ranging from the examination of transnational spaces, to the interplay between different scales of analysis, and to the historicization of territoriality, into the practice of transnational, comparative and global history may contribute to a deeper, wider and more complex understanding of 'Europe'.
European Review of History, 2018
Historians have often considered the international veterans' organizations which came into being ... more Historians have often considered the international veterans' organizations which came into being after World War I as proof of the pacifist, internationalist orientation of the majority of the Great War ex-combatants. However, veterans active in these organizations were often inspired by specifically national and partisan objectives that belie any simplistic equation between altruistic transnational activism, international cooperation and pacifism. Conceiving of war veterans as transnational actors, this article explores the origins and decline of the veterans' transnational sphere in the interwar period. It singles out four shades of competing veterans' internationalism and describes the crucial differences that separated actors such as Henri Barbusse, René Cassin, Henri Pichot and Carlo Delcroix, among others. The article argues that both the veterans' organizations and their protagonists, while reaching out across national borders, remained embedded in specific constellations of personal trajectories, political partisanship, nation-state interests and interstate alliances. Their political and social activities also tried to reshape, and were subjected to, existing or emerging spatial configurations such as Great Power alliances and wider internationalist projects. Thus, the article shows that there was no homogeneous transnational sphere in international veteran politics; it was rather the competition between different internationalist practices and projects which shaped veterans' transnational activities.
Cold War History, 2018
Despite the importance of war veterans issues in many nation-states after World War II, Cold War ... more Despite the importance of war veterans issues in many nation-states after World War II, Cold War historians have never examined international veteran politics. By analysing scholarship and hitherto unexamined primary sources, this article surveys the realignments taking place in veteran politics in different countries and investigates the process leading to the creation of the World Veterans Federation in 1950. It argues that the Cold War profoundly shaped international veteran politics after 1945, and that veterans’ international organisations became political instruments and spaces of Cold War tensions. By revealing how Cold War events, particularly the Korean War, created opportunities for the veterans’ international activities under American leadership, this article offers insights into the impact of the Cold War on the transnational sphere.
Politics, Religion & Ideology, 2018
The early relations between Italian Fascism and German National Socialism are an understudied alb... more The early relations between Italian Fascism and German National Socialism are an understudied albeit crucial aspect of the history of fascism. This article explores the hypothesis that the Italian fascist movement influenced the development of the early NSDAP before 1922. While Fascism and Nazism were rooted in the same transnational ideological background, Italian Fascism emerged as a clearly distinct political phenomenon in 1919–1921. This article argues that Hitler’s NSDAP transformed into a fascist party and movement only after the example of Italian Fascism became well known in postwar Munich. By analysing German perceptions of Mussolini’s movement, particularly through Bavarian and Austrian newspapers, the article shows how völkisch ultra-nationalist groups came to see Fascism as a model to follow. The subsequent transformation of the NSDAP from the summer of 1921 onwards can be seen as a process of fascistization and hybridization in which the Italian fascist example was appropriated and adapted by the Nazis. Thus the article proposes advancing towards a transnational, rather than ‘generic,’ understanding of fascism.
Historia y Política, 2017
The establishment of the Franco regime entailed the consolidation of a set of ultra-conservative,... more The establishment of the Franco regime entailed the consolidation of a set of ultra-conservative, Catholic, and fascist gender roles, as well as masculinity ideals. However, Francoist masculinity has been largely neglected by historians. This article examines the historical evolution of Francoist war veterans as a manly archetype. The article argues that this ideal of masculinity was hegemonic during most part of the dic- tatorship. By analysing journalistic, literary and filmic sources, and by observing the intimate and familiar dimension of the lives of men who fought and won the Spanish Civil War, the article explains the implications and transformations of such manly ideal, which drew on the driving notion of the “recreation of the warrior”. A mythical conception of the man as a war-experienced individual preserved its hegemony by fus- ing with other masculinity models, thus becoming a key factor to sustain social and familiar order and gender relations in Spanish society until the mid-1960s.
European History Quarterly, 2017
This article argues that analysis and contextualization of the history of the Francoist veterans ... more This article argues that analysis and contextualization of the history of the Francoist veterans of the Spanish Civil War (1936–39) leads to an understanding of Franco’s dictatorship as a fascist regime typical of the late 1930s and early 1940s. It reveals the congruence of the regime with the phenomenon of neo-fascism during the Cold War era. Drawing on a large range of archival and published sources, this article examines the history of the main Francoist veterans’ organization, the Delegación Nacional de Excombatientes (DNE) of the Falange Española Tradicionalista y de las JONS (FET-JONS), between 1939 and 1959. The evolution of the Francoist veterans’ organizational structures and political discourses can be understood as part of a process of fascistization and defascistization, which provides rare insights into the overall relationship between fascism and war.
Journal of Modern Italian Studies, 2016
This article explores the origins of the historical relationship between war veterans and Fascism... more This article explores the origins of the historical relationship between war veterans and Fascism. Transcending the predominant paradigm of the controversial ‘brutalization’ thesis (George L. Mosse), the article relies on a transnational perspective that focuses on the interconnections between historical events and on processes of political communication and symbolic appropriation. Examining historical processes taking place in different European countries, as well as their effects on Mussolini and the Italian interventionists, the article argues that a transnational process of symbolic appropriation of the notion of the ‘veteran’, taking place between 1917 and 1919, is crucial to understand how the Fascist ideology and movement were born.
Pasado y Memoria, 2016
Resumen Este artículo explora el amplio debate internacional mantenido por historiadores con-temp... more Resumen Este artículo explora el amplio debate internacional mantenido por historiadores con-temporaneístas en torno a la tesis de la " brutalización " , popularizada por George L. Mo-sse a partir de su libro Soldados caídos (1990), y según la cual la experiencia de gue-rra de los soldados del frente en la Primera Guerra Mundial habría sido la causa de los altos niveles de violencia política de la República de Weimar y, por ende, el origen del nacionalsocialismo y el genocidio. El artículo clarifica las raíces de la interpretación mosseana, analiza las críticas, reformulaciones y usos de la " brutalización " y conclu-ye que el fuerte debate mantenido, a pesar de no alcanzar consenso, terminó por con-sagrar una noción sugerente, aunque obscura y de cuestionable capacidad analítica, en el lenguaje profesional de los historiadores.
A. Salvador and A. G. Kjøstvedt (eds.): New Political Ideas in the Aftermath of the Great War. Pagrave Macmillan, 2016.
One of the most important current debates on the history of Franco’s regime focuses on the politi... more One of the most important current debates on the history of Franco’s regime focuses on the political support that the dictatorship enjoyed. Many Francoist veterans of the Spanish Civil War became either active or passive collaborators and eventually transformed into members of the fascist party Falange Española Tradicionalista y de las JONS (FET-JONS). In this article, I discuss the importance of the war veterans’ social benefits for the consolidation of the Franco dictatorship. I contend that the regime granted privileges, jobs and sinecures to the veterans, as methods of attracting their political allegiance. By organizing such system of benefits, the dictatorship did not save the masses of veterans from poverty, hunger and disease, but it did succeed in strengthening the veterans’ loyalty to Franco. I conclude, therefore, that the veteran politics of FET-JONS and the Franco regime were in harmony with both the Italian Fascist and German National Socialist examples of veteran politics.
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Books by Ángel Alcalde
The contributors examine not only the endogenous Spanish political and military cultures of the Francoist coalition, but also the transnational influence of foreign groups. The roots of Francoist political culture are found in the Falangist and Carlist militias, and Civil Guard units, that lent their support to the military rebellion. The war experiences of conscripts, colonial troops, and junior officers forged the Francoist ideology. It was reinforced by fascist influences and assistance from Germany and Italy, and the lesser-known contributions of Swiss volunteers. At the beginning of the conflict the rebel side was not homogeneous. But it weaved together a complex, transnational web of political and military interests in the midst of a bloody and destructive war, transforming itself in the process to a political and dictatorial platform that was to rule Spain for many years.
Los excombatientes franquistas fueron una parte fundamental del apoyo social al régimen de Franco, realidad que justifica observar el excombatentismo franquista con la misma perspectiva empleada para estudiar los fascismos europeos. Este libro analiza, por un lado, la historia de la principal organización de excombatientes de la dictadura franquista, la Delegación Nacional de Excombatientes de FET-JONS, y, por otro lado, la cultura de guerra que los veteranos de guerra mantuvieron viva en España durante décadas. Se explica cómo el encuadramiento, los discursos y representaciones y los mecanismos de gestión de privilegios sociales permitieron al régimen franquista manipular en su beneficio las identidades excombatientes de aquellos hombres marcados por la experiencia de la guerra civil española.
Articles and Book Chapters by Ángel Alcalde
The contributors examine not only the endogenous Spanish political and military cultures of the Francoist coalition, but also the transnational influence of foreign groups. The roots of Francoist political culture are found in the Falangist and Carlist militias, and Civil Guard units, that lent their support to the military rebellion. The war experiences of conscripts, colonial troops, and junior officers forged the Francoist ideology. It was reinforced by fascist influences and assistance from Germany and Italy, and the lesser-known contributions of Swiss volunteers. At the beginning of the conflict the rebel side was not homogeneous. But it weaved together a complex, transnational web of political and military interests in the midst of a bloody and destructive war, transforming itself in the process to a political and dictatorial platform that was to rule Spain for many years.
Los excombatientes franquistas fueron una parte fundamental del apoyo social al régimen de Franco, realidad que justifica observar el excombatentismo franquista con la misma perspectiva empleada para estudiar los fascismos europeos. Este libro analiza, por un lado, la historia de la principal organización de excombatientes de la dictadura franquista, la Delegación Nacional de Excombatientes de FET-JONS, y, por otro lado, la cultura de guerra que los veteranos de guerra mantuvieron viva en España durante décadas. Se explica cómo el encuadramiento, los discursos y representaciones y los mecanismos de gestión de privilegios sociales permitieron al régimen franquista manipular en su beneficio las identidades excombatientes de aquellos hombres marcados por la experiencia de la guerra civil española.
Relying on conceptual history, this article explores the historical origins of the concept of “combattentismo”, which is clearly related to fascism. Conceptual-historical analysis allows the author to adopt a critical position regarding the use of “combattentismo” as a working concept in historiography. Even if it is used by historians to describe the events of 1919-1922, this word cannot be found in historical sources dating from those years. However, by studying sources from the 1920s and 1930s, the article reveals the existence of an important political debate around the very concept of “combattentismo”, from 1923 onwards. This discursive struggle was a symptom of the existing conflicts between the war veterans’ movement and fascism. The article concludes with a more precise conceptualization of the notion of “combattentismo”.
This article explains the origins of the main war veterans’ organization of the Francoist Regime, the Delegación Nacional de Excomba tientes of FET-JONS. First, I explore the initial Francoist plans conceived during the civil war for the demobilization of soldiers. Second, I analyse the political contacts and transfers that took place during 1939 between the fascist powers and several Francoist military and politicians, around the symbolic rituals of the demobilization process. As a result, I argue that Francoist excombatentismo, in its organizational and discursive expressions, was an element of identity between the Francoist regime and the European fascisms.
La historia militar no debe ceñirse exclusivamente al estudio de las tropas, las estrategias o las batallas, sino que además debe centrarse de forma prioritaria en las relaciones de lo militar con la política, la sociedad y la cultura. En este sentido, el asociacionismo nos permite abordar todas estas cuestiones, ya que éste fue y sigue siendo un factor de socialización fundamental dentro del ejército, pero también más allá de éste, cuando el individuo abandonaba el mundo castrense. Este dossier se concibe como un punto de partida para el estudio de dicho asociacionismo militar y, en definitiva, del papel político-social que han tenido los militares a lo largo de la contemporaneidad.
ESTUDIOS
TRADUCCIONES
RESEÑAS
http://ruhm.es/index.php/RUHM/issue/view/10
Asimismo, seguimos publicando la tradicional sección de estudios, con seis espléndidos estudios escritos por Roberto Muñoz Bolaños (URJI), Alberto Ausín Ciruelos (Universidad de Burgos), Leonardo Canciani (CESAL), Xavier Torrebadella-Flix (UAB), Emiliano Casas (CONICET) y John E. Fahey (Purdue University) que siguen la línea editorial que pretendemos promover desde la revista. Además, son artículos que van desde la edad media a la contemporaneidad.
Tenemos el orgullo de publicar una traducción de un capítulo escrito por el historiador S. Hodkinson titulado "¿Era la Espata clásica una sociedad militar?, sin duda un título sugerente y que se enmarca dentro de los estudios sociales y culturales que pretendemos promover. Finalmente contamos con una completa sección de reseñas.
La foto de portada creemos que representa fielmente el contenido del dossier, pues se trata de un acto de homenaje a las "Madres de los Caídos" del bando sublevado, en el que se le entregó un ramo de flores a la madre de más edad que perdió un hijo en la guerra. La foto está tomada en el año 1965 en un acto celebrado en Vilanova de Lourenzá (Lugo, Galicia, España. El archivo nos obligó a poner el nombre castellanizado), por lo que se puede comprobar como años después la guerra sigue estando presente en la política, en la sociedad y en la memoria de la gente. Esperemos que disfrutéis con su lectura como nosotros/as hicimos realizando este número, y solo nos queda dar las gracias al coordinador (Ángel) y a todos los autores/as por animarse a publicar con nosotros/as. Muchas gracias. Agradecemos toda la difusión posible.